Back in 2020, on a literal mountain top, a vision came to me in the form of three words: Workshops Against Empire. I was standing on a mountain top because it was the lock-down phase of the pandemic, and how else was I going to celebrate my birthday except by going on a backpacking trip? And sure, those words were … Read More
Even in a logline?
You’ve heard me go on about the critical third layer of your big-picture story structure: your characters’ Goals and Motivations. But recently I was reminded that this element of storytelling is so critical to our understanding of story, period, that we can’t even quite tell what’s going on in a logline that omits this. Here’s the definition of a logline (a term from … Read More
The most critical layer of your story’s structure
When I began my deep-dive into story structure after grad school, I knew that much of what was taught in books on craft was unnecessarily complicated, and far from universal in terms of what it actually took to get a novel published. I knew this because I took what I learned from studying many beloved structures with many raving fans—The … Read More
On radical vulnerability
On my last live masterclass, “The Bones of Winter,” I decided to do something that felt risky, right there at the beginning of the call: I admitted to everyone that I was now being called upon to start a medical treatment that could come with long-term cognitive consequences. Honestly? For a writer—or really, maybe anyone whose identity and livelihood has … Read More
